Forever Falling
by NameForsaken
Summary: Weiss leans on her teammates after a confession causes her to second-guess herself. *Contains some original characters*
1. The First Confession

**Author's Note: So, my friend and I have kind of been going crazy during this RWBY hiatus, so to keep our minds in check until the next volume, we decided to create our own characters based in the RWBY-verse. What started out as a few concepts and designs has turned into some pretty strongly-developed (and what we believe to be) loveable characters, and I've decided to test them out in some "what-if" types of scenarios with the already-established RWBY characters we all know and love. So, be warned, there are a couple of mentions/interactions with Original Characters, but I hope that regardless, you'll read, share, and enjoy! :)**

Loving her was a disease. Or at least, that's what most people at Beacon seemed to think of Weiss's crush. In some ways, though, they were right—like how every time Weiss was around the girl, her stomach began to do somersaults, and her hands became clammy at just the thought of being able to touch her. Sometimes, she was so head-over-heels for the girl that she could barely manage to complete a sentence about her without tripping on her own tongue. It was painfully obvious to almost everyone in the school how Weiss felt, but for some reason, either because she was too afraid to address the topic, or she really was just that absent-minded at times, Mina still didn't seem to notice or care that she was all Weiss seemed to think about anymore.

"Hey, are you alright?"

Weiss snapped out of her thoughts, and turned to face the fair, vibrant girl stretched out beside her in the grass. She had her arms behind her head, her long, jasmine hair flowing around her like a sea of glittering sand, and she was watching Weiss with those wide, dark blue eyes that always seemed to be so filled with life. Weiss blinked rapidly as she glanced up at the tall, scarlet trees that surrounded them, and it took her a moment to remember where she was.

"I'm fine," she said after a couple of seconds, giving the girl a timid smile. How could she not be fine? She was spending a lazy, carefree afternoon in the Forever Fall with the person she cared for most, and although she longed to just tell her how she felt, she was happy enough just knowing that Mina was near.

The blonde let out an exaggerated sigh, and turned her gaze back up toward the bright, faultless sky. "I don't know if it's just me, but you've been kind of lost in your own little world all day... It _must_ be pretty great if you're spending more time there than with me."

Weiss felt her face flush. _If you only you knew..._ She sucked in a deep breath, and tried to steer her mind away from adoring thoughts of Mina, but it did not prove to be an easy task when the girl was laying only a few inches away from her. Maybe, if things were a little less complicated, Weiss would finally work up the nerve to tell her the truth. But Weiss was a Schnee, and that meant she had a certain image to maintain, whether she liked the person everyone else made her out to be, or not. Like most other situations in her life, she didn't get to have a choice.

Mina crossed her leg over her knee, and distractedly bounced her foot up and down in the cool forest air. "Whatever's on your mind, you know you can tell me, right?"

The pale girl just closed her eyes. "Have you ever thought about what you'd do if you found out tomorrow was your last day on Remnant?" The question came out of nowhere, and Weiss was a little surprised as it left her mouth, but she hoped it would at least direct their conversation away from anything unintentionally romantic for the time being.

"Um, no, not really..." her friend muttered, a hint of anxiety in her voice as she seemed to mull over the question. "Why? You're not planning on dying tomorrow, are you?"

Weiss opened her eyes, and let out a hesitant laugh. "No, of course not... I was just curious, that's all. Leading a life as a Huntress could be pretty dangerous, and, you know, unfortunate things might happen..."

Mina bit her lip. "Well, you shouldn't think like that, Weiss. You and your teammates are strong; as long as you stick together, you shouldn't have to worry about those kinds of things."

She exhaled sharply. "I'm not saying it's going to happen, I'm just wondering if you've ever thought about what you'd do if it _did_ happen... Who would you spend your time with?"

"Well, when you put it that way..." The blonde lowered her arms to the grass, and rolled over on her side to face Weiss. "I guess I'd want to spend some time with my family, and let my parents know that they couldn't have done a better job raising me... That I appreciate all they've done for me, and that if I could go back, I wouldn't change a thing."

Weiss nodded, a small smile forming at the corners of her lips. She admired how fondly the girl spoke of her family, and how she didn't ever try to hide her loyalty to those she cared about. Weiss's relationship with her own father was a little less than warm growing up, and she would've given anything to be able to speak about her family in that same glowing way Mina spoke about hers. Still, her father was the only true parent she had, and she respected the man nonetheless.

Mina furrowed her eyebrows thoughtfully as she continued to ponder Weiss's hypothetical predicament. "I'd also want to thank my friends and teammates—I wouldn't be as strong as I am today if it weren't for their help and support. And Lance... Oh, I don't know if I'd ever be able to say goodbye to him..."

"Then don't," Weiss said, her heart sinking the same way it always did at the mention of Mina's boyfriend. She didn't hate Lance; she had no reason to. She just hated the fact that he held a very special place in Mina's heart, one that Weiss knew she would never be able to fill.

Her friend frowned. "What do you mean, _don't_? I can't just leave without saying goodbye after everything we've been through... I'd owe him too much, Weiss. It would kill me not to give him that closure."

Weiss pushed herself up in the grass, and folded her hands gently over her knees. She turned away from Mina as her smile began to wither, and her throat felt as though as it was slowly closing in on her. "I mean you don't have to make it a forever thing," she just whispered. "You'd see him again someday... If he truly loves you, you'll always be in his heart, even if something bad does happen."

"Oh." Mina let out a soft hum. "You make it sound so romantic... Who knew _you'd_ have a lovey-dovey side, of all people?"

"Hey," Weiss mumbled, leaning forward and resting her chin on her knees. "Regardless of what some people may think, I'm not always a snooty, monotonous brat."

Mina cracked a smile. "I know you're not, Weiss. It's just fun to pick on you, sometimes."

She shrugged. "I guess I had that coming..." She should've been used to Mina's playful nature by now, as the girl practically spent most of her free time formulating outrageous pranks on multiple students and staff at Beacon, but for some reason, that afternoon, Weiss couldn't help but take her friend's teasing to heart. She knew she could be difficult to get along with at times, but Mina knew more about Weiss than almost anyone in Vale, aside from her teammates and Samuel, and it terrified her how much the girl seemed to have a hold on her.

"Don't sound so discouraged," the blonde told her, reaching out a hand, and resting it on the toe of Weiss's boot. "You really are so much better than you give yourself credit for."

_Too bad it doesn't matter,_ Weiss thought, biting the inside of her cheek. She glanced down at her boot, and solemnly pulled it back from Mina's touch. "I don't know..."

Mina rolled her eyes, dropping her hand back to her side. "You know, I don't just spit out compliments to anyone... If I say you're worth it, Weiss, I mean it. I bet any one of your teammates would back me up on that, too."

Her throat was burning, now. She had to turn her gaze away from her friend once more as tears began to form behind her eyes, her breath quickening as she tried to keep them from falling. She knew Mina was only trying to lighten her spirit, but with each beautiful, sugar-smothered word that left the girl's lips, Weiss knew deep down that they would never mean what she wanted them to. She couldn't force Mina to feel something she didn't, and she knew that the longer she allowed herself to pine after the girl, the more she was going to get hurt. The thing was, she couldn't just shut off her heart or mind whenever she saw it convenient—even if she wanted to stop caring for Mina, Weiss knew that at that point, she had fallen too deep to pull herself out.

"Okay, clearly I'm not getting anywhere with you," her friend joked, though Weiss could tell by the uneasy tone of her voice that the silence was making her uncomfortable. "So... Since _you_ brought it up in the first place, who would _you_ spend your last day on Remnant with?"

Weiss sniffled, and hugged her knees closer to her chest. "Who says I want to spend it with anyone?"

Mina grunted. "You're kidding, right? You can't be _that_ cold."

She let out a heavy sigh. "Well, I'd say I'd want to spend it with my father and sister, but then again, I'm not sure they'd even care if I was there or not..."

"Weiss, come on."

"I'm being serious!" she said, her voice starting to waver. "But if that's not what you want to hear, then I'll just be stupid and generic, and say I'll spend the day with my teammates... Happy?"

Mina shook her head. "You're doing it again."

Weiss drew in a hot, shaky breath, and lifted her gaze to Mina's. "Do you _really_ want to know the truth? I'd want to spend my last day with you. I want to spend every day with you, Mina." She dug her fingernails deep into her thighs as she willed herself to just say the words, to finally let her secret out in the open, even if it left her wounded forever. She was sick of holding it back, sick of pretending to be something she knew she was not. Mina deserved to know the truth. "I love you," she murmured.

The blonde just furrowed her eyebrows. "I'm sorry, I didn't hear—"

"I said I love you!" she shouted, forcing herself to her feet. She turned away from Mina as a trail of tears rolled down her cheeks, her heart racing as she realized what she'd just done. But it was out, and now Mina knew, so why didn't Weiss feel any better? If anything, she just wanted to get out of there as fast as she could.

But Mina wasn't about to let her get away. Weiss heard her shift in the grass, and not even a few seconds later, she was at Weiss's side again, her bright, confused eyes burning a hole in Weiss's heart. "What do you mean?"

She swallowed back a mouthful of tears. "I meant exactly what I said... I love you, and I'm sorry things couldn't be different between us." She pushed away from Mina, her vision beginning to blur, and took off into the depths of the forest while she still had the chance.

Though Mina called out her name, Weiss did not turn back. If the girl really cared about her, she would've followed her and demanded her to stay; instead, after a few short, halfhearted shouts, Mina's voice finally faded into the background with the rest of the forest, and Weiss was, once again, alone.

_Maybe it's better this way,_ she thought to herself as she stomped clumsily through heaps of colorful, crunchy leaves. As long as she was alone, she couldn't get hurt, right? But then why did she feel like her heart had just been torn out of her chest? It wasn't like Mina had flat-out rejected her; it was Weiss who had pushed her away, Weiss who ran away before Mina even had the chance to process the confession. But the wait was much too long and painful, especially when Weiss already knew what her mentor would say. No matter how much she wished for it, she knew Mina would never return her feelings.

After about ten minutes of wandering aimlessly through the forest, Weiss finally stopped by a thin, cool stream of water that was slowly beginning to dry. She lowered herself to the base of a wide, sap-covered tree, and rested her head in her knees. She stared gloomily at a large, matted patch of grass as she wiped away a salty streak of tears with the back of her hand. "Pull yourself together, Weiss," she muttered shakily as a sob escaped from her throat. "No one will ever love you if they see you like this..."

Why couldn't she be more like her sister? Winter was strong, graceful, obedient, and she would never let something as childish as an unrequited crush stop her from living her life. She always got whatever she wanted, even if that meant throwing Weiss under the bus for something she didn't do—their father believed Winter over Weiss every time, and she was sure that if her sister ever found out about Weiss's feelings for Mina, it would mean the end of Weiss's days as the heiress of the Schnee Dust Company. In what world would anyone be okay with someone as _disgusting_ as Weiss running possibly the most important company known to man?

"You don't even want to run that stupid company," she told herself, shaking her head. If it were up to her, she would move as far away from Atlas as possible, and hide herself amongst the civilians so neither her father, nor any of her family, would ever find her again. Maybe if she was lucky, she would actually find another girl like her, someone who wasn't afraid to love, someone who would see Weiss as anything other than a cold, perfection-obsessed rich girl. But the only girl she wanted was Mina, and for some reason, Weiss just couldn't wrap her head around the idea of a life without her.

She could practically hear her father's angry, disparaging voice, telling her to just give up. He never did believe Weiss would ever make something of herself, and maybe he was right; she wasn't coordinated enough to win a tournament, barely strong enough to take on a pack of monsters herself, and while she was smart, she found it almost impossible to get anyone to listen to what she had to say. Not even Ruby listened to her half the time, and when she did, she rarely ever took Weiss's thoughts or suggestions seriously.

Weiss sighed, and pulled her scroll from the pouch on the back of her belt. With quivering hands, she opened her phone log, and noticed that she had three missed calls, two from Ruby, and one from Yang, who had also left a voicemail. Instead of listening to it, though, she immediately sent the message to her trash bin, then folded her scroll back up, and tucked it away. She leaned her head against the bark of the tree, and closed her eyes as she listened to the soft sound of rustling leaves from a few feet behind her.

An uneasy feeling welled in the pit of her stomach as the rustling grew louder, but she tried to convince herself that it was just a squirrel or rabbit, if only because she was too exhausted to get up and move somewhere safer. _I'm not bothering anyone,_ she thought, sinking lower into the grass. _If I just keep to myself, that thing will go away._

A moment later, the rustling stopped, and Weiss let out a relieved breath. She rolled back her shoulders, and adjusted her position against the tree, thinking she might try to take a short nap and clear her mind before heading back to the school. She just wanted this day to be over, to get on with her life as if she hadn't just made a huge fool of herself in front of the person she cared for most. Tomorrow would be hell.

The more she tried to make herself comfortable, though, the more she felt unsettled. It was dead silent, yet again, and Weiss had the sneaking suspicion that she was being watched. She opened her eyes just as a low, angry growl broke the silence, and a giant, black-furred, bone-spiked Beowolf jumped out from the shady trees in front of her.

Weiss immediately picked herself up to her feet, her heart racing as she reached for her rapier that clung to her left hip. Her icy, blue eyes darted from the Beowolf to the matted patch of grass just a few feet away, and it was then that she realized she was standing in the middle of that Beowolf's bed.

The creature of Grimm snarled at Weiss from behind its eerie mask, its burning, red eyes filled with rage as it lowered the front half of its body to the ground, reading itself to pounce.

"What are you waiting for?!" Weiss shouted at it, surprised by the furious tone in her voice as she rotated Myrtenaster's Dust chambers, and pointed the blade at the beast. Usually, she would just go in and pierce the monster before it had a chance to scalp her, but for some reason, something was holding her back, a tiny, morose echo in her head telling her to withdraw her attack. Her fragile mental state made it difficult to focus on the task of defeating the Beowolf, and she would've given anything at that moment to just crawl up into a little ball and disappear. She didn't want to fight, and she didn't want to face the plethora of emotions that were swirling around inside her heart. For once, she just wanted to give up.

And then she had made up her mind. Her eyes filled with tears again as she dropped her weapon to the ground, and crossed her arms in front of her face to brace for the attack. As the creature started to charge, Weiss prayed that it would all be over quick, and that she wouldn't feel a thing. She was so tired of hurting, so tired of pressing on like everything was okay, when in reality, it never, ever was. She was doomed from the second she decided to enroll at Beacon, and she should've listened to her father when he told her she wasn't strong enough. No matter how hard she'd tried, she couldn't forget about the horrible things she had witnessed, endured, and suffered, but finally, it was all about to come to an end.

"Weiss! No!" a voice suddenly shouted from close by, followed by the metallic sounds of a weapon being uncoiled. Before she knew it, a large, crescent-shaped blade sliced through the air, and the Beowolf's head was separated from its body, landing in a splash of red, white, and black about three yards away. The creature's body collapsed to the leaf-scattered dirt, and a moment later, disintegrated into a heavy, smoky dust that was carried off into the wind.

Weiss let out a strained sob, and fell to her knees in the grass, not daring to meet the silver eyes of her rescuer. Her one chance to finally be freed from the turmoil that was consuming her from the inside had been destroyed, and now she had no choice but to continue on like nothing was wrong.

"Are you okay?" her red-cloaked teammate asked, her high-pitched voice filled with a mixture of relief and concern.

_Of course I'm not,_ Weiss thought to herself as she buried her face in her palms, warm, sticky tears absorbing into her pallid skin. She didn't give her leader an answer, though, afraid that if she opened her mouth again, she would never stop crying.

Ruby recoiled her scythe, and dropped to the grass beside Weiss. "Why didn't you fight that thing? It could've killed you."

Weiss turned her head away from her, silently wishing that the girl would just go away.

"...Unless you wanted it to kill you?" she continued, a hint of sadness in her voice as she came to realize Weiss's intentions. "Is that why you didn't fight back?"

Still too vulnerable to answer, Weiss just gulped back another mouthful of tears, and rocked back against the base of the tree. What use was there in answering when Ruby had already figured out what she needed to know?

"I... don't understand," the brunette murmured. "Why would you—why would _anyone_ want to...?"

"Just... shut up," Weiss muttered after a moment, her voice still cold and shaky. "Leave me alone... _please_."

Ruby let out a haughty laugh. "After you almost just got mauled? Nope."

Weiss lowered her hands from her face, and turned to her teammate. "I—I'm not going to let that happen again."

"Well, I'm still not leaving. Not unless you're with me."

She groaned. "Fine. But don't expect me to say anything."

The other girl nodded. "Then I'll sit here for as long as it takes. You know, until it starts getting dark, because then Yang would have a cow if we don't make it back by then..."

Weiss rolled her eyes, trying to ignore the light pang in her chest at the mention of their other teammate. Yang had been nothing but supportive of Weiss since she found out about her feelings toward Mina, and Weiss felt somewhat guilty even thinking about wanting to hurt herself when she knew that Yang would've done anything to snap Weiss out of her masochistic ways. If there was one person she knew she could count on to understand, it was Yang, even though the girl made Weiss want to drive her head through a wall at times.

"Hey," Ruby said after a moment, glancing around the forest with narrowed eyes. "Didn't you come out here with Mina? Did she leave you here by yourself?"

"I—" she started, her mind beginning to numb as she tried to think of an excuse for Mina's absence. There was no way she was going to tell Ruby the truth. "It's none of your business."

Her teammate frowned. "But she's your mentor—isn't she supposed to stay by you at all times?"

"Ruby, you never listen to your mentor," Weiss breathed. "I've seen you with him a total of, what, three times in the past semester?"

She bit her lip. "Okay, you've got a point..." She turned back to Weiss with a calculating expression. "But you're, like, always with Mina. So something must've happened."

Weiss clenched her fists in her lap, wishing for once that Ruby would just let this go. But if there was one thing her partner was good at, it was pushing people's buttons, especially when it came to Weiss and their other teammates. "I... really don't want to talk about it. Okay?"

Ruby just crossed her arms, and stared at Weiss for what felt like a lifetime. She furrowed her eyebrows in that same way she always did when she was trying to figure someone or something out, and after a few long moments, her eyes widened, and she finally opened her mouth to speak. "This is about your crush on her, isn't it?"

"I'm not talking to you about this!" Weiss shouted, her face flushing as she sank further into the grass.

"Why not?" Ruby asked, genuinely curious. "Because you don't think I'll understand?"

Weiss sighed. "How could you possibly understand?"

She shrugged. "I won't know until you tell me what happened. I can't promise I'll understand, but I _can_ promise that I'll try."

_What are you, a self-help book?_ Weiss turned her gaze up toward the slowly-changing sky, tracing the colors with her eyes as they transitioned from shades of light blue to reddish-orange. In about an hour, it would be dark, and Professor Goodwitch would begin her evening perimeter check to make sure all of the students were back on campus for the night. She took a deep breath, and mentally kicked herself for what she was about to admit. "I... told her how I felt... And then I ran away."

Ruby winced. "Ooh, that's not good."

Weiss scowled at her. "And this is why I didn't want to say anything in the first place. I know, I'm an idiot; you don't have to rub it in."

"No, I'm not teasing you!" her teammate assured her, holding her hands out in a defensive manner. "I'm sorry. I just—why did you run away?"

"Because I already knew what she was going to say," Weiss told her, that familiar achy feeling welling inside of her again. "That she's in love with Lance, and that I need to get over her."

Ruby gave her a thoughtful look. "Easier said than done, right?"

She nodded. "Exactly..." She pulled her knees in tightly to her chest, and turned her gaze toward the toes of her boots. "It wasn't like this with Neptune... I was never afraid of putting myself out there, and I never worried about how he'd react. Even when he turned me down for the dance that first time, I just shrugged it off..."

"I don't think you liked him as much as you thought you did," Ruby said. "And then there's that whole thing about Mina being a girl..."

Weiss swallowed. "Some people don't exactly take an attraction like that lightly around here. I know that if my father ever found out, I would be as good as dead..."

Ruby gave her a sideward glance. "Aren't you exaggerating a little?"

"You don't know my father," she just said, shaking her head. "Trust me, how I feel is anything but _normal_ in his eyes, and that means I'm not good enough to be a Schnee... What's the point of risking my entire family for one silly, unrequited crush?"

The brunette shifted in the grass, and let out a quiet hum. "Maybe you're just tired of being alone, and being with Mina makes you feel _not_ alone?"

_Wait,_ Weiss thought, lifting her head. She looked at her partner, surprised that she was actually making sense. Maybe Ruby was a lot more perceptive than Weiss gave her credit for. "What would you know about that?" she just asked.

She gave her a sad smile. "I know it's not really the same thing, but I know how it feels to lose someone you care about. You're afraid that you messed up your relationship with Mina, and that she's going to leave you, kind of like how my mom left me when I was little. I thought I was never going to get over it."

"But that wasn't your fault, Ruby," Weiss pointed out. "If I've actually messed things up with Mina, it's all on me; what happened with your mom was something completely out of your control."

Ruby distractedly pulled her cloak over her shoulders, and started to spin the left cross clip between her fingers. "My point is that even though it's a sucky situation, it's not the end of the world. It definitely wasn't something worth throwing yourself to a Beowolf..."

Weiss closed her eyes as they suddenly began to fill with tears again. She couldn't believe that she was actually going to let that creature attack her just because she was too afraid to own up to her confession, and face Mina the next day. She knew she had acted childish, but the truth that Mina would never return her feelings just hurt so much, and she wasn't sure how she would ever get over the girl. Most people saw Weiss as a nuisance or a threat simply because of her last name, but Mina didn't treat her like a corporate product of her father's company; she treated her like a regular human being, just a girl who was flawed and somewhat broken, but who she could help fix. The only other person who actually attempted to understand Weiss's cold front was Yang, but unlike Mina, her teammate was too impatient, and sometimes didn't know when to stop pushing Weiss for personal information. Sometimes, it really felt as though Mina could feel Weiss's pain, even though she was sure that was her undying crush filling her mind with false hopes and beliefs.

"You don't have to always act like that," Ruby told her after a moment. "Just because I'm younger than you, it doesn't mean I don't know how to cope with other people being sad."

"It's nothing against you," Weiss sniffled. "I just hate feeling like this."

"Well, you're allowed to be sad." She hesitantly lifted a hand to Weiss's shoulder, and gave it a gentle squeeze. "It's okay. I'm not going to judge you."

Weiss tensed underneath her teammate's touch, but for once, she didn't swat her hand away, if only because this was probably the first time Ruby actually cared to listen to Weiss, and she had to give the girl credit for at least attempting to be a good friend. "Why do you care what happens to me, anyway?" she whispered sullenly.

Ruby eased her grip, and lowered her hand back to her side. "I'm your leader, Weiss; it's my job to look out for you. If something bad ever happened to you on my account, I don't know if I could ever forgive myself."

She sucked in her bottom lip as she let her partner's words sink in, wondering if that was really all Weiss was to her—just a team obligation. Sure, Weiss hadn't exactly been the best teammate in the past, but she'd thought that the two of them were finally past that rough patch. As much as she hated to admit it, she did consider Ruby and the rest of her teammates her friends, and she sincerely hoped that they thought of her that way, too. They'd been through a lot together since their arrival at Beacon, and she would've readily put herself on the line if it meant protecting the other members of her team.

"Weiss?"

"Hmm?"

Ruby clicked her tongue. "We're friends, right?"

Weiss smirked in spite of the salty tears that still streaked her face. "Yeah. We are."

"Good," the other girl just said, her tone more lighthearted than before. "Because I wouldn't want all of this to be for nothing."

_Trust me,_ Weiss thought, resting her head in her knees, _it's definitely not for nothing._


	2. Lip Slip

The tears on her cheeks were burning, now. Every nerve in her body was tender, and the only distraction Weiss had from her heartbreak was the sound of Ruby's steady, reassuring breath beside her. She opened her eyes and looked up at her teammate, longing to feel just a little bit closer to her. Everything was going to change now that her feelings for Mina were out in the open, and with each moment that passed, Weiss felt herself slip further away into a place of self-loathing. To Mina, she was probably nothing more than just an assignment, a first-year who she'd probably never even talk to again once she graduated from Beacon. Even Weiss's own father treated her as though she were a worthless piece of trash, and it was difficult for her not to think of herself that way sometimes. She was desperate to find some kind of meaning in her life, to feel anything other than the constant rejection she'd been forced to face since the date of her birth. She just wanted to be wanted.

Her heart hammering, she lifted herself to her knees, and turned to face her teammate. She raised a hand to the other girl's cheek, and before she could change her mind, she leaned forward, and lightly touched her lips to Ruby's, all of her pain and fear melting away in that moment. Immediately, the brunette pulled away, the look of confusion in her silver eyes nearly shattering Weiss's heart all over again.

"I—I'm sorry," Ruby whispered, mustering a fragile smile. "But I'm not—"

"I'm so _stupid_," Weiss groaned, cutting her off. She buried her face in her hands, too ashamed to look up at her teammate. "I don't know why I did that."

Ruby sighed. "It's okay. Just don't do it again."

Weiss squeezed her eyes shut. "Don't worry, I won't." She didn't even like Ruby like that—heck, she considered her a nuisance more than anything else. Sure, she had her moments, and she was finally starting to take her role as leader a little more seriously, but she was still just _Ruby_; young, ignorant, and sometimes immature. Besides, Weiss was already in love with Mina, no matter how much it killed her to admit it.

"It's getting dark," her teammate said after a moment, her tone more guarded than before. "We should probably start heading back."

_Just leave me here_, Weiss thought to herself, still unable to meet the girl's gaze. If they went back now, Blake and Yang would definitely notice that something about her was off. The last thing she needed was yet another round of Yang's Twenty Uncomfortable Questions.

Ruby let out an indignant grunt. "...And you're not going to listen to me, are you?"

Weiss bit her bottom lip. "Go on without me," she finally muttered, her voice muffled behind her palms. "I'll catch up in a minute."

"Right. I'm going to leave you here so you can almost be killed by a Beowolf again," Ruby said sarcastically. "Not going to happen."

"Ruby, just give me a second!" She lowered her hands from her face, and gave the girl an icy glare. "I'm still... _processing_ all of this."

The brunette folded her arms over her chest. "I'm not mad, or weirded out, about that kiss. So can you just get over it? We really _do_ need to head back."

Weiss leaned her head back against the base of the tree, and it took everything in her not to roll her eyes at the girl. Even after their unusually pleasant conversation, even after everything that had just happened, Ruby still didn't seem to get that it was _more_ than just a confession to Mina, or a misplaced kiss—she still had these feelings that she didn't want to have, and pretty soon, all of Vale, including her father, would know the truth. She was becoming less like a Schnee every day, and more like a faceless nobody.

Her thoughts were interrupted by a low beeping sound coming from Ruby's corset, and she turned her attention to the girl just as she was taking out her scroll. She glanced at the screen once before shooting Weiss a knowing look, and tipping the device in her direction. "Yang wants to know where we are," she told her.

"Fine," Weiss said, pushing herself forward in the grass. She picked herself up to her feet, and walked over to her teammate. "Tell her we're on our way back, then... _Don't_ tell her anything else."

Ruby furrowed her eyebrows. "Are you going to be okay?"

Weiss pursed her lips together, and started walking toward the forest entrance. "I'll be fine. Just please, don't mention any of this to anyone."

"You know Yang's probably going to figure it out on her own anyway, right?" Ruby asked her, following closely behind.

She cast her gaze downward as she slowed her pace, wondering if she was really that easy to read. Sure, Yang always seemed to know the exact moment when Weiss started to think about Mina, but it wasn't much of a secret anymore that the girl was constantly on her mind. But _Ruby_? There was no way Yang would pick up on Weiss's awkward little mishap. Not unless her teammate opened her big mouth.

Ruby swung her arms lazily at her sides as she synced her steps with Weiss, a pensive expression on her face as the school's large, looming structure came into their view.

Weiss stopped walking as they neared the building's entrance, and reached for the other girl's forearm. "You're not going to tell, are you?"

Ruby scanned her surroundings for a moment before turning back to Weiss, and giving her a small shrug. "Not if you don't want me to."

"And if Yang asks what happened...?"

"I'll tell her I found you in the Forever Fall by yourself," she said. "I won't even mention Mina."

Weiss released her grip on her teammate's arm, and drew in a deep breath. "You'll leave out the part about the Beowolf?"

Ruby nodded. "Like it never happened."

"Good." She took a couple of steps toward Beacon's front gate, and observed the mass groups of students walking around the school's grounds. When she didn't spot Mina, a sudden wave of relief washed over her, and she summoned just enough courage to take that last step through the gate. As long as she avoided Mina for the rest of the night, she would be able to recollect her thoughts, and figure out what to do about her situation when she awoke the next morning.

As she and Ruby continued toward the main building, Weiss caught sight of a tall, dark-skinned Faunus standing against a wall with his foot propped behind him, his emerald eyes staring up into the cloudy, purple sky.

"Isn't that Samuel?" Ruby asked her, following Weiss's gaze. "Wonder what he's doing out here by himself."

Weiss swallowed. If anyone would be able to understand what she was going through, it was Samuel. "I'm going to go check up on him. You go back to the dorm."

Ruby raised an eyebrow. "You're not going to run off again, are you? Because if you are—"

"No, Ruby, I just want to talk to him." She unfastened Myrtenaster from her belt, and handed it to her teammate. "Here, take this inside. _Don't_ mess with my Dust."

The brunette gave her a mischievous smile. "So tempting..." She took the rapier with her left hand, and lowered it to her side. "See ya later."

Weiss waited until Ruby was inside before turning her attention back to Samuel, and starting in his direction. As she approached him, the hurt and rejection that she had been feeling all day began to resurface, but instead of holding back the tears that threatened to fall from her eyes, she picked up her speed, and frantically threw herself at the Faunus. "Sam!" she choked, dropping to her knees before him. "I did something really, really dumb."

Samuel's eyes widened in bewilderment, and he slowly slid down the wall to Weiss's level. He hesitantly lifted a hand to the girl's shoulder, and cleared his throat. "Weiss, I've got to say, I've never seen you like this before."

"I know, I know," she said breathlessly, trying her hardest not to cry. She was so tired of having to hide her emotions, so tired of being misunderstood by everyone around her. Samuel was the only one who knew what it was like to want something he couldn't have, the only one who understood how much it hurt having to put on a brave face for the world every single day. "I just... I don't know what to do anymore."

He gave her shoulder a gentle squeeze. "Don't talk like that. I'm sure whatever it is, you'll find a way to get past it."

She shook her head. "No, you don't understand... I _told_ Mina. It kind of just slipped out, and now I've ruined everything."

"Wait, you mean you _told _her... you love her?"

Weiss felt her face flush as she met his warm, sympathetic gaze. "My exact words were, 'I love you, and I'm sorry things couldn't be different between us.'"

Samuel gritted his teeth. "Yeesh, how did she take it?"

"I... I kind of ran away before she had the chance to respond." Weiss lifted a hand to her face, and brushed away a few strands of long, white hair that had stuck to her cheeks. "Have you seen her within the past hour or so?"

He frowned. "I'm afraid not." He removed his hand from her shoulder, and dropped it into his lap. "I can't imagine how terrified I'd be if Jaune ever found out how I felt... I always knew you were crazy, Weiss, but I never thought you'd let something like that slip."

She narrowed her eyes at him. "Hey! I didn't come over here to be insulted!"

"Relax," he said, straightening his back. "I'm only trying to get you to lighten up."

Weiss exhaled sharply, wanting nothing more at that moment than to just curl up in a ball and hide away from the world. "I just... I don't want to lose her. But now I'm afraid I've messed it all up."

Samuel gave her a sideward glance. "If you really think Mina's going to want to stop being your friend just because you have unrequited feelings for her, then you really don't know her as much as you may have thought."

"I—" Weiss closed her eyes. "That's not what I'm afraid of."

"Oh," he murmured, his tone suddenly softer than before. "I think I get it. You're afraid of being rejected—of being hurt."

Her breath caught in her throat as her friend's words sank in. Somehow, she knew he would understand, but she didn't realize how painful it would be to finally hear the truth. "I—I let her in," she whimpered. "I gave her complete control when I told her that... She doesn't know it, but anything she does now could either make me or break me."

"It's scary," Samuel agreed. "It's why I still haven't gathered up the nerve to tell Jaune how I feel about him... But you're going to be okay, Weiss. You'll see."

She sniffled, opening her eyes. "If my father saw me like this, _vulnerable_, he would probably just tell me to suck it up, and turn his back to me until I've finished crying... He'd say something like, 'Schnees must always be composed—no one must see the imperfections inside.'"

Samuel rolled his eyes. "You know I think that's complete bull."

"He'd probably smack you if he heard you say that..." She wiped away a fresh trail of tears with the back of her hand, and lowered her gaze to the cool, damp grass below her. As the moon started to rise above them, the air became chilly, and Weiss knew that if she didn't head inside soon, she would catch a cold.

Samuel seemed to sense this, though, as he removed his blazer, and carefully wrapped it around Weiss's shoulders. "Your father doesn't intimidate me."

She pulled the blazer tightly around her, and buried her face in its sleeves as she let out a strained sob. "He would probably try to have you killed, Samuel... One look at those ears, and he'd send all of his security to take you down."

He made a point to his wiggle his ears as a wicked grin spread across his face. "He can try all he wants, but no one's messing with this Faunus."

Weiss looked up at him. "Your confidence amazes me sometimes, you know that?"

He just smirked. "I could say the same about you most of the time. Tonight, though, not so much."

"I'm sorry," she said, smoothing her hands over the folds in her skirt. "I know I'm not myself right now... I just needed a moment to let it all out."

"You don't have to apologize, Weiss," Samuel assured her. "It's okay to break down every once in a while, despite what your father may have told you."

She gave him a short nod. "I'm not going to be able to keep it from him forever, though. He's bound to realize there's something _different_ about me."

Her friend crossed his arms. "Are you talking about your feelings for Mina again? Because I just don't see why it would matter so much to him... It's your life, you should be able to live it however you want, free to feel whatever you want."

"Because I'm a _Schnee_," she told him. "I'm not _supposed_ to have these feelings. I'm _supposed_ to be a normal, strong, independent girl. It's really not about what my father thinks, it's about how the rest of the world may perceive us if I'm not exactly the person he raised me to be."

Samuel sighed. "Again, I think that's ridiculous."

Weiss bit the inside of her cheek. He wasn't the only one who felt that way, but if Weiss ever told her father what she truly thought of him, and his impossible standards, there was no way she'd make it to see the end of that conversation. "Anyway, I guess it doesn't matter right now, since people here seem to be a little more lenient, but the second I step foot into my home again, I've got to find a way to go back to being that perfect little girl."

"And you will," he promised her. "But like you said, right now, none of that matters."

She gave him a half-smile, and turned her head up toward the quickly-darkening sky. The moon's fragments were now shining bright above them, and most of the groups of students had long since retreated inside. Weiss's eyelids began to feel heavy as exhaustion weighed upon her, but she wasn't ready to go back to her team just yet. "Samuel... When I saw you just a while ago, you were standing here by yourself. You appeared to be deep in thought."

He let out a light laugh. "I was probably thinking the same thing you were, then. About how much it sucks to like someone who will never like you back."

"Jaune?" Weiss tried her best not to look disinterested. While she was grateful to finally have someone who shared her forbidden feelings, she still had a difficult time wrapping her head around the fact that Samuel's "special someone" was none other than Jaune Arc, the biggest klutz in Beacon.

Samuel ran a hand through his wild mane of hair, and distractedly scratched at the backs of his lion-like ears. "I had a dream about him last night," he said after a moment.

Weiss blinked. "Oh?"

"It was very realistic," he continued. "The two of us—Jaune and I—were just hanging out in the war room, practicing our sparring, when one of Cardin's guys came up behind Jaune, and dumped a bucket of ice water over his head. Since I'm a third-year, the stupid kid barely gave me a second look, but I took advantage of that to use my Semblance to scare the living daylights out of him... Pulled some needles out of my belt, and directed them at him with a deafening roar. I stopped the needles before they could touch him, of course, but I'd knocked him back so hard, he ended up falling right back into the bucket, getting a taste of his own elixir."

Weiss huffed. "Now I know where Mina gets her prankster habits from..."

He gave her a sly wink. "I told you, no one messes with this Faunus—_or_ his friends."

"It appears so," she enthused.

Samuel dropped his arms to his sides, and leaned his head back against the wall. "But anyway, after that, Cardin's boy fled the war room, sopping wet, and Jaune was absolutely in awe of what I'd just done. I told him we could stop training so he could dry off, so he agreed, and we headed back to the locker room."

Weiss felt her face redden as she realized where Samuel was going with this. Still, she kept her mouth shut, if only because a part of her was actually slightly amused.

"I kept an eye out for any more of Team CRDL while Jaune changed into something dry, but no one else was around at the time, so I ended up just going back to Jaune, and sitting with him until he could catch his breath," Samuel said. "He said he was grateful for my help, but that he would've been able to handle himself if I would've just let him... I apologized, though, told him I couldn't help it, but he didn't seem to understand. He said he noticed that I was always coming to his rescue, but I tried playing it off as just being a good friend... He knew better, though—Pyrrha did the same for him before she ended up confessing that she had a crush—"

"I'm pretty sure that never happened," Weiss interrupted. "I would've heard about her saying something like that."

He just rolled his eyes. "This was a dream, Weiss, remember?"

"Right," she said. "Sorry. Continue."

"Anyway, even though it was pretty much written all over my face, I refused to give him the satisfaction of admitting how I really felt." His ears began to droop as he hesitated for a moment, and Weiss could see that talking about this was taking a lot out of him.

_I admire your courage_, she thought about the Faunus, giving him what she thought to be a comforting smile.

"So he—he somehow thought it would be a good idea to force it out of me," Samuel muttered, his voice beginning to thin. "He grabbed me by the wrists, pulled me into him, and kissed me... But then I woke up."

Weiss gasped. "That—that's cruel. And completely out of character for someone like Jaune."

He shrugged. "That's how I knew it wasn't real—but it still got to me, you know?"

"Yeah..." She clasped her hands together in her lap, pressing her nails deeply into her skin as her fingers started to numb from the continuous drop in temperature. "We're both hopeless, aren't we?"

"_I_ am not hopeless," Samuel insisted. "And neither are you. Maybe a little lovesick, but definitely not hopeless... There has to be other people out there like us."

Weiss stifled a yawn. "I guess you're right... But then again, it doesn't really matter. No one in Vale is stupid enough to admit to having feelings for someone of the same gender, nonetheless act on them."

"No one except for you, Weiss," he teased. He reached his arms above him, and stretched them up toward the sky. "But hey, as much as I'd love to continue this conversation, I don't think I'd be able to speak coherently much longer without a little shut-eye."

She glanced down at the blazer that covered her slender body, and reluctantly slipped it off. She handed it back to Samuel. "I guess I am a little tired, too."

Her friend got to his feet, and offered her his hand. "If you'd like me to, I'll have a talk with Mina. Make sure she goes easy on you the next time you cross paths."

"No, that's alright," Weiss said, taking his hand. She stood up, and steadied herself against his strong body. She broke away from him, and took a couple of steps back toward the entrance of the main building. "Thank you for listening, though."

He started off in the opposite direction, toward the school's dining hall. He waved over his shoulder as he walked away, disappearing into the last crowd of students as they made their way inside.

Weiss turned her back to him, and entered the main building, surprised to find that the foyer was empty. She sucked in a rigid breath, and took the nearest hall to the student dormitories. On the way to her room, she tried to push everything that had happened within the past couple of hours into the back of her mind, even though she knew Yang would probably talk it all out of her by the end of the night. Showing up late without an explanation had become a habit for Weiss, now, one she knew she ought to break.

Hesitantly, she stopped in front of her room, and lifted a hand to the doorknob. As she pushed through the door, bright, yellow light flooded out into the dark hallway, causing Weiss to wince. She shielded her eyes with her arm as she stepped into the room, and allowed her vision to adjust to her surroundings.

"Well, look who it is," Yang called out from her bunk almost immediately as Weiss made her presence known. She swung her feet over the side of the bed, and jumped down to the hardwood floor beneath them, landing with a resounding thud. "When I saw Ruby with your weapon, I kind of thought you'd been eaten by a Grimm, or something."

She lowered her arm to her side, and narrowed her eyes at her teammate. "I'm still here. Sorry to disappoint." She turned toward her own bunk, and was pleased to find Myrtenaster laid out carefully at the foot of her bed. She glanced up at the bed above her, but the sheets that surrounded her leader's bunk were drawn, which meant that the girl probably did not want to be disturbed.

"So, where were you?" Yang continued to press, taking a seat in the rocking chair by the door.

Weiss gently picked up her weapon, and carried it over to her luggage in the far left corner of the room. "I was taking a walk in the Forever Fall."

The blonde gave her a studious look. "You know, you've been taking a lot of 'walks' by yourself outside of Beacon, lately."

"The weather's been nice," she just said, knowing that Yang probably didn't buy her excuse for a second. She opened up a thin, rectangular case, and set her rapier inside, securing the armor-covered lid, and sliding it against the wall.

Yang crossed one leg over the other, and leaned back in her chair. "Mina stopped by a little while ago, looking for you. I know you were with her."

Weiss's stomach dropped at the mention of her mentor's name. She slowly walked back to her bed, and positioned herself on the edge of the mattress so that she was facing Yang. "What did she say?"

"That you were in the Forever Fall together, and that you ran off for some reason, but you told her not to follow you, so she came back to Beacon instead."

"Oh." She glanced at the bunk across from her, where Blake was propped on her elbows, her gaze glued to a book that was splayed open on top of her pillow. She didn't seem to be paying much attention to Yang and Weiss's conversation, but even if she was, Weiss knew Blake wouldn't say another word about it. "Is that all?"

Her teammate cocked her head to the side, shooting Weiss a look of suspicion. "She said she's worried about you..."

Weiss frowned. She wondered why Mina seemed to care so much, or what it even was that she was so worried about. Even if Samuel was right, and that Mina wanted to still try and preserve their friendship, it didn't change the fact that now every time Weiss heard the girl's name come up, it made her want to crawl away and hide. "I'm fine," she told Yang, an obvious lie. "I wish everyone would stop treating me like I'm not, though."

"That's just the thing, Weiss," Yang said, arching an eyebrow. "You can say it all you want, but it's pretty obvious to me that you're _not_ fine... I don't know what happened between you and Mina, but whatever it was, it's got you pretty shaken up."

Without warning, Weiss's bottom lip began to tremble. She hated that Yang always seemed to see right through her, no matter how high and strong she built the walls around her heart. Her facade had worked almost flawlessly around her family and acquaintances for years, but the moment she took her first step onto Beacon's campus months ago, it was as if all of those walls just suddenly came crashing down. "Why do you even care?" she asked her teammate, her voice beginning to crack.

"Because this isn't like you," the blonde commiserated. She pressed a fist to her temple, and gave Weiss a long, sad glance. "I know you're sick of talking about it, but sometimes, the best way to overcome these types of things is to just let it out... I'm only trying to help."

Weiss's eyes began to fill with tears again, and she immediately averted her gaze, afraid that Yang, and the rest of her teammates, would notice. She tried to take a few breaths, but each time, her throat seemed to close tighter, forcing Weiss to give in to the tears, and to the shame that always accompanied each one. She flung herself across her bed, and buried her face into her pillow, silently pleading with herself to just stop the tears from flowing. But it was too late, and she was well-aware that Yang had seen her, and just the thought of how pathetic she looked only caused her to cry even harder. She didn't even know _why_ she was so upset, just that she wanted it to all be over, and for her roommates to go away.

Almost as soon as Weiss's tears had started, Yang had sprung out of her chair, and made her way to Weiss's bed. "What did I do?" she said in a panicked voice, her presence looming dauntingly over Weiss like an anvil hanging from a frayed rope. "Weiss, look at me."

"Stop, just _stop_," Weiss squeaked, rolling away from the girl. "You don't _get_ it; you _never_ will!"

Yang let out a frustrated sigh. "Get _what_?"

"Everyone loves you!" She lowered the pillow from her face, but still refused to make eye-contact. Instead, she focused her gaze intently on the nearest wall, blinking fiercely as a stream of tears continued to run down her cheeks. "You could have any guy you want, Yang. You're nice, free-spirited, and you're never afraid to speak what's on your mind... I'm nothing but a cold, ruthless little brat who can't even get my own father to pay attention to me... _Nobody_ wants me."

"Do you really think that's true?"

She gulped back a sob. "How could anybody want me when I don't even want myself?"

"You don't really mean that," Yang told her. She lowered herself to the edge of Weiss's bunk, and gently laid a hand on her shoulder.

Weiss flinched instinctively at the girl's touch. She wasn't used to this type of affectionate gesture, but as much as she wanted to push Yang away, she couldn't find the energy or strength to protest. "I just want to be alone," she whispered.

Yang leaned in closer to her until Weiss could feel her warm, soothing breath against the back of her neck. "No one wants to be alone, Weiss. Not even you."

Her muscles tensed as Yang draped an arm around Weiss's crumpled body, but she quickly realized that no matter how much she complained or cried, her teammate was not going to leave. It was never in Yang's nature to abandon someone who was hurt, either physically or emotionally, and Weiss should've figured her broken heart was no exception. Even if she didn't give Yang the satisfaction of revealing what happened between her and Mina back in the forest, it was still nice to know that, even if she didn't always feel or want it, she had someone to lean on.

"You're going to be okay, Princess," Yang assured her as Weiss quivered timidly in her arms. She rested her chin against Weiss's small, fragile shoulders, and protectively tightened her embrace.

Weiss closed her eyes again, her breathing finally starting to slow, and morosely wondered if her teammate was right. Maybe, all she needed was just to have a little faith for once. So Mina didn't love her; it wasn't the end of the world. No matter how hard things got, she knew, despite all of the bitterness in her heart, that she still had a good group of friends looking out for her, and that at the end of the day, they would always be the ones to pull her through.


End file.
